Everybody needs a higher education. Without free education some people will be denied basic education. Educational basics are life basics. Everybody needs to know the fundamental basics of reading, writing, comprehension, math and whatever else is necessary to function in society.

(Before I begin my official text, I'd like to say that I'm heavily biased toward my opponent's proposition therefore it will be interesting debating against it.)

I'd like to thank my opponent for starting this debate, and I'm proud to be debating against him.

I'm going to point out that he failed to create a clear resolution other than "free education". While I was going to argue that we already have that, it seems based on his argument text he believes that "higher education" should be free. I'm going to refute his points now.

So, since he has failed to create definitions, I will make some of my own.

Free Education: Attending a place of higher education, for example colleges and universities, for free.

Basic Education: An understanding of basic mathematices (ie. multiplication, addition, etc), some history and science.

1. Everybody needs a higher education.Well, this is a bit of an assumption. While it would be beneficial to everyone if they had an education, there is no clear NECESSITY to have one. If someone, I'll name him Bob, finds a job at a construction site, he's not going to need to have an understanding of astro physics and quantum theory. What he will need, is a pair of strong arms that he can't get through school.

His only other point was the need for basic education.

2. Without free education some people will be denied basic education.

Everyday, across this country, children wake up to go to our perhaps most effective means of government spending. The Public Schools. Here, kids learn what I've defined as basic education. They learn US History, they learn the history of Mesopatamia and Russia, they learn how to divide numbers, they learn that Velocity = distance/time.

Higher education is not required to give people a basic education. In fact, higher education is defined as being above basic education.

Now onto the Disadvantages of Free Education

1. Spending

Do you honestly think, that as our government is struggling to finance high schools and middle schools they will be able to perhaps buy up all private universities, create their own, and manage them? No. We're already in a huge deficit and we need to cut back on spending, especially on things not necessary, like this.

or we could have a communist revolution. Jk.

2. Crowds out the private market.

For hundreds of year reputable colleges and universities have given the highest education to those daring enough to walk their halls. If we were to implement a free form of higher education, people would stop going to these private colleges, who will without a doubt provide a higher quality of education than public colleges, and start going to a lesser college simply because its cheaper. This already happens in the private scale in terms of higher education, but making college free would make this issue skyrocket.

Not only is this a violation against the individual, but is in fact a means of providing insufficient higher education to those who would generally go to somewhere like Yale or Stanford.

i thank con for his argument.
Education is the most important thing you can have. You can go anywhere with an education. Everyone should have access to higher educational opportunities. Just because you can't pay for it doesn't mean you shouldn't go. If higher education were free, more people would be smarter, would have brighter knowledge and better job opportunities. 71.3 percent of students drop out of college and university because of the costs. That"s near 3/4th of the population of college students. Without education some people will be denied basic education. Everybody needs to know the fundamental basics of reading, writing, comprehension, math and whatever else is necessary.

1. Education is the most important thing you can have, therefore we should make it available to everyone.

Your argument is based on nothingness. Is education really the most important thing you can have? Is education necessary to do manual labor? No. Education is not the most important thing in this life. The most important thing in this life is your life itself. You can still lead a good one without education.

Look at people like Steve Jobs, and Bill Gates. Did they go to college? No. Yet they are still near universally looked up to as heroes of the uneducated world.

2. Everybody needs a higher education.

You basically just reiterated what you said earlier, ignoring my refutation. Not valid.

3. A lot of people can't go to college because it isn't free.

To begin with, I'd like to say that my opponent's statistics are heavily exaggerated. 71.3% of students do not drop out of college. I'd like to see his source for this.

Secondly, people can still get quality higher education for a cheap price. Hundreds to thousands of community colleges exist across the country that are extremely cheap. Cost is in fact, not a large factor in getting higher education, as community colleges fall under the title of higher education and are readily available to the public.

4. "More people would be smarter. They would all have better jobs."

Not everyone can be a CEO, or an executive at AIG, or a pharmaceutical rep, etc. Manual labor is what runs the country. If all people had access to education, then to an extent you'd need an even HIGHER level of education to get a good job. All of a sudden, higher education would become thouroughly unimpressive.

Yes. More people would be smart if they had higher education. They're already available to you at a convenient price. Look for your local community college.

5. Without education some people will be denied basic education.

I already refuted this. Please see my arguments above. She only reiterated what she had already said.

Now, since my disadvantages of Free Education were completely ignored, I will simply extend them by copying and pasting them.

1. Spending

Do you honestly think, that as our government is struggling to finance by CouponDropDown" href="#">high schools and middle schools they will be able to perhaps buy up all private universities, create their own, and manage them? No. We're already in a huge deficit and we need to cut back on spending, especially on things not necessary, like this.

or we could have a communist revolution. Jk.

2. Crowds out the private market.

For hundreds of year reputable by CouponDropDown" href="#">colleges and universities have given the highest education to those daring enough to walk their halls. If we were to implement a free form of higher education, people would stop going to these private colleges, who will without a doubt provide a higher quality of education than public colleges, and start going to a lesser college simply because its cheaper. This already happens in the private scale in terms of higher education, but making college free would make this issue skyrocket.

Not only is this a violation against the individual, but is in fact a means of providing insufficient higher education to those who would generally go to somewhere like Yale or Stanford.

To summarize this debate so far: My opponent has provided a few advantages of free education, all of which I have refuted. While she says that people are denied access to higher education because of cost, I defined higher education as a college or university. This means that community colleges are readily available to any enterprising young adult who wishes for a better future.

i thank con for his argument
but......
If you think about it yes free education would cause more taxes. but most people dont have the money to afford college or university. and ARE being denied basic education simply by not having an opportunity.

Con stated
"If we were to implement a free form of higher education, people would stop going to these private colleges"
not necessarily giving a free form of higher education would give more people an opportunity to qualify for dream jobs that require college or university.

. Imagine you didn"t have that kind of money, but you really want to study to be a lawyer. You need post-secondary education for that. But because you"re not able to pay for your educational needs you"re denied of being able to work in that profession. Therefore without free education students aren"t being treated equally.

Again, I thank my opponent for his readily available argument.I'm going to just jump into my opponent's case itself.

1. Pro Admitted Disadvantage

"if you think about it yes free education would cause more taxes. but most people dont have the money to afford college or university. and ARE being denied basic education simply by not having an opportunity."

She basically stated that "Yes, we have a disadvantage. But our advantages outweigh our disadvantages."Except it doesn't. I have another disadvantage that has barely been touched by pro and I will now get to it.

2. Pro tried to refute my point that people would stop going to Private Colleges.

They're ignoring simple logic. If you're provided free higher education, why would you choose to go to a public college instead of a private one? It isn't hard to grasp. You didn't really have a point here other than "not necessarily." Yes necessarily. I know I would, if it provided the same quality of education as a private college.

Thats basically all they touched upon in their last speech. Now I will explain why I won the debate.

In the first round, my opponent presented a decent case in which she stated that everyone needs a higher education and its only fair that everyone gets one. She made a few points about the need for basic education and how higher education gives it.

I refuted these arguments by stating: (1) Everyone does not need a higher education (2) people are already taught basic education.

These were their only two points I had to refute. I presented disadvantages which were ignored in their second speech.

The aff brought up an exaggerated statistic with no source. Had no weight in the debate. She then added points to the debate saying "Education is the most important thing you can have." "Everybody needs a higher education", "A lot of people can't go to college because it isn't free", "More people would be smarter. They would all have better jobs." and finally "without education some people will be denied basic education.

Half of these I had already refuted, and then I eventually argued against the new original ones she had brought up.

In her last speech, she failed to even touch upon my attacks on her points and simply talked about my disadvantages she didn't refute at any other time. In this last speech, I saved my disadvantages.

The unfortunate part of exclusive private colleges, which I agree, have outstanding education systems, is that, for the most part, only the elite can afford to attend. I believe it would be much more prestigious if money was taken out of the picture and determination for enrollment was strictly on an individual's academics, stature and personal achievements. If daddy's trust fund can't buy you in, would you still be able to make it? Out of respect, I'm sure there are plenty of rich kids who are intelligent and could hold their own, but it is disheartening to know that the less fortunate hardly stand a chance regardless of their intelligence. You should have to earn your way to a good education. By "free" I assume financially free, not a free ticket to enrollment.

Teachers need the money and wages not just to teach the children but to support the school budget. Schools need more fundings and oraganizations and curricular activities to make the children more enthusiastic I have to say that no school will take the opportunity to provide free education

Community colleges are not cheap; just for one class that takes a semester and only yields three credits most colleges would charge over 250 dollars. That is only for one class. What about the price of books? Even used college books cost over 50 dollars each. Nowadays to attend college fulltime is almost impossible, unless one's family is rich.
That is the reason we see many foreigners with work visas working in our hospitals and factories as doctors and engineers. How is our youth going to be able to compete in this globalized market against people from China that even though has an oppresive goverment does provide free higher education to its youth. If countries with less resources can do it, why not the U.S? Education should not be for profit either. It should be the right of our youth to attend college full time without worrying about financing it.